Fake news flash: Sloppy journalism leads to an instant corporate crisis.

A bogus press release tricked lazy journalists last month, an act of deception that's become all too easy in the rapid-fire, race-to-be-first world of online news and social media.

News outlets, including the Associated Press, and technology sites TechCrunch, Engadget, and The Next Web, reported virtually verbatim what they saw in the apparent release planted on PRWeb, which claimed Google was spending $400 million to purchase ...